ABSTRACT
In this chapter we focus our analysis of possibilities for delimiting gendered heteronormativity and advancing gender equality in internet dating upon what amounts to the quintessence of seeking intimacy online—chemistry. While without doubt chemistry is viewed by daters as the vital attribute of their engagement with internet dating, characterising this hallmark proves to be decidedly elusive. The daters in our sample seem convinced it is the crowning glory of their endeavours, the fundament of their motivation and their goal, and yet it appears as a portmanteau term including a bundle of possible features and much more slippery than the certainty of its significance in daters’ narratives would seem to suggest. An added difficulty is that, since we are centrally concerned with innovations in intimacy, we must attend to both common and uncommon understandings of it. In summary, we characterise chemistry as about beginnings and referring to a mesmerising sense of immediate and special, even unique affinity. In the setting of internet dating, chemistry may begin online but is almost always reliant on embodied affirmation offline. Though this embodied affinity most often describes sexual connection, chemistry is not necessarily sexual or even mutual, let alone leading to a lasting outcome. Intriguingly, chemistry does not inevitably take the form of upholding gendered heteronormativity.
